Phantoms Fled
by Carlier36
Summary: Rachel dreams of the past and present in Philadelphia and nearly lets her guilt get the better of her. Season 2 Spoilers.


"Phantoms of thought and memory thinned and fled."  
― Siegfried Sassoon, _The War Poems_

Haunted house –

**Phantoms Fled**

Yellow haze hung in the air despite the dark. More unnerving, though, was the silence. Rachel stood in the middle of what must have once been a street, though she couldn't identify where. She turned in a slow circle. Everything for miles was rubble.

Glancing down at herself, she found bare feet and a thin nightgown clinging to her curves, the lacy kind she hadn't seen in years. A street sign poked out from beneath crumbled bricks and though it was bent and blackened, she could just make out _Jessup. _

_S. Jessup Street. Philadelphia._

She might have expected tears of guilt or shame or sorrow but she was too dried up for that. Independence Hall wasn't far away. She'd have to climb through the decimated streets bare foot but she could make it.

Along the way there were so many reasons for her unshed tears. Black forms made of ash that had once been people. Buildings that had seen the Revolution and the Militia and everything in between, reduced to dust. Toys and bikes and lanterns and coffee mugs, all crushed, left abandoned and twisted in the streets.

It took less time than it should have to reach the Hall but, then, time rarely runs the way it's meant to in dreams.

Rachel stood in front of the former façade of Independence Hall, half a brick wall still standing silhouetted. The clock tower lay broken, limestone and brick scattered along the road like so many pebbles.

"You coming inside?" Bass leaned against what remained of the front windows, light shining through broken glass behind his head, hands in his pockets.

For once, she didn't feel the sick pull of hatred at the sight of him but still just stood there in the ruined road, ashes beneath her bare feet. "Thinkin' about it."

"Well take your time. Miles has always been known for his patience."

"Miles?"

"Who do you think left a light on?"

She realized the light behind him wasn't the moon or the glow of fire but an electric bulb and, stepping over the jackhammered sidewalk, pressed her hand to the ice cold bricks beside him.

"Go on. He's waiting for you."

Rachel turned her head, meeting those steely blue eyes as he reached out to stroke the backs of his fingers down her bare arm. "It's sad, really," she murmured. "I can't even kill you in my dreams."

"This isn't a dream, Rachel. It's a- nightmare. A memory. A haunting."

"You're my poltergeist?"

"Philadelphia's your poltergeist. I'm just part of the package deal."

Sparing a glance over her shoulder at the city, laid flat and barren by long-dead science, Rachel sighed. "Typical." When she looked back, he was gone, leaving her alone in the silent yellow dark, the single bulb burnt out like all the rest. She stepped over the broken half-wall and into a memory, into the pristine entrance of the Monroe Republic's former Independence Hall. Flowers sat by the doors, the room flooded with candlelight that bounced off the polished surface of Bass' most prized keepsake: the Liberty Bell.

Rachel reached out, running her fingers along the crack, along the obvious metaphor for their lives. She knew where she was, knew when she was. The nightgown had seemed all too familiar, after all.

Walking down the hall, a trail of ashes in her wake, she pushed open the double doors into Miles' room. The bed stood against the wall with the covers turned down, facing the windows; candles blazed along the surface of the dresser. "I heard you were waiting for me."

Miles lifted his head from the dresser, tossing his cufflinks on the wood top. "Yes, I was," he murmured as he stripped off his thick, green jacket and laid it on the bed. The belt beneath followed along with his boots and he ran his fingers through his hair, standing before her as Miles and not General Matheson. "God, Rachel, I missed you."

He wrapped his arms around her, head tucked into her shoulder, and she breathed him in, fresh off a month putting down a rebellion in Maryland. _I missed you too. _She hadn't said it aloud the first time they'd stood there like that either.

"Are you all right?" he asked finally, pulling away far enough to meet her eyes. "How bad was he this time?"

"I don't want to talk about him." Rachel ran her fingers along the dark hair at his temple and he seemed to understand. Since this had started, since they had given in to the old feelings, they did their best not to talk about Monroe or about her captivity. Better to pretend he wasn't half-responsible for her misery, not when they were busy burying their pain in each other.

Miles cupped her cheek in his hand and she covered it with one of her own, eyes closing. "I'm sorry, I was gone so long this time," he murmured instead, tipping her chin up so he could kiss her. She leaned into him, arms coming up around his back and soaking up his heat. It was soft and gentle and everything they'd never been; it felt wrong.

Digging her nails into his shoulder blades, she deepened the kiss, tongue sliding rough against his and he seemed to understand what she needed. Miles turned them from the door, backing her up across the room and sinking into his desk chair, pulled out from the wall. She settled on his lap, hands moving to his shoulders and his jaw, blond hair falling over their faces.

His palms roamed her back, fingers twisting in the silky fabric there as she ground her hips against his, earning a groan and a hand tight on her thigh. Tugging on the nightgown, Miles pulled the edges up over her head as she lifted her arms. He tossed it to the side so she sat naked on his lap, toes brushing the floor.

He dragged her close against his chest, wrapping his arms around her. The room was warm with candlelight and Miles' hands on her bare skin as he cupped one breast in his calloused palm. Reaching between them, she unbuttoned his pants with nimble fingers even as he nipped and sucked at her pulse point.

Rachel pulled him free from his pants, teeth sinking into her lip with anticipation and wound her arms around his neck, letting him lift her hips up and slide her down onto the hard length of him. She screwed her eyes shut with a quiet moan, fingers toying with the hair at the back of his neck as he filled her. "_Miles._"

As she sank down against him, he buried his face in her hair, breath short and heavy. "God, Rachel," he mumbled and she pretended she couldn't feel the wetness on his cheeks as she pushed herself up onto her toes, content to do all the work for a moment while he gathered himself. At least it kept her mind off everything else.

Miles slid his hands down her sides after a few thrusts, gripping her hips tight and fierce and rocking her against him, her bare feet scrambling for purchase on the cold hardwood floor. Tipping her head back, she whimpered, hand stiff in his hair as he ducked his head, mouth searing across her throat.

Bass leaned against the door, hands in his pockets again, and she squeezed her eyes shut, lips pressed together. "Can't you just give me this?" she pleaded, arching her back into Miles.

"Told you. You're being haunted." He pushed himself off the door, wandering across the room so he stood just inches behind them. Miles remained oblivious.

"Go away," she whispered uselessly, even as he reached out a hand to cup her cheek. His palm was slick against her skin and she realized, somewhat disconnected from the thought, that his hands were covered in blood. For all her complicated exterior, Rachel's subconscious was rather more straightforward. She winced, turning her head involuntarily to kiss his palm, tasting coppery blood on her tongue.

Miles thrust inside her, whispering something no doubt titillating or guilt-ridden that she didn't quite catch. She bit her lip, wishing she could bring herself to cry as Bass moved around behind her, fingertips caressing her bare back. "You're so beautiful, Rachel. So destructive."

He crouched behind her, brushing his lips across the knobs of her spine, and when she opened her eyes again, the warm comfort of Independence Hall was gone. All that remained was Miles and the chair beneath her, Bass at her back and the endless debris surrounding them.

Bass' hand skated over her hip, skin tingling beneath his touch. Long, deceptively graceful fingers moved to the inside of her thigh and she shivered in spite of herself as he slipped down between them, fingertips brushing sensitive skin and muscle.

Rachel moaned through the guilt, one hand sliding down onto Miles' chest, his heart silent and still beneath her fingers even as he clung to her, just a ghost of a memory. Bass brushed a kiss over her tailbone and then she felt the warm drag of his tongue in the crevasse of her back as he pushed himself up, still rubbing jagged, intoxicating circles between her legs.

His free hand skimmed her curves, fingers sliding just beneath the soft, heavy weight of her breast, slicked with sweat, before continuing up the length of her arm. He covered her hand with his own larger one, thumb curling around the white, gauze bandage at her wrist.

She frowned at the sight of it suddenly there on her skin that had been bare and unbroken only moments before. Rachel couldn't remember cutting herself but, glancing over Miles' shoulder at the shadowy landscape of broken buildings, she had to wonder why she hadn't finished the job.

"Why? Why would you do this to yourself?" Bass asked, mouth close to her ear. Miles groaned, arms tightening around her waist as his hips bucked up against hers, coming hard and reminding her of his memory-presence. Her fingers stroked at his cheek, wishing he were really there, really inside her and really that oblivious to her pain. It was easier when he was oblivious, when he just wanted her body and, out of a twisted sense of obligation, her safety.

"Look around you. I did this. We did this," she answered finally, darting a glance at him from the corner of her eye.

Bass flicked his fingers against her, hard and unexpected, and she cried out, head tipping back against his shoulder with Miles still deep inside her. "We're the same, you and me."

"No." She slammed her eyes shut as he wrung her out, tears finally stinging though she wouldn't let them fall. "No."

"Yes, Rachel. You've killed thousands. The Butcher of Baltimore is just a notch on your bedpost."

Rachel started awake in Willoughby with her wrists bandaged.


End file.
